“Don’t say I didn’t warn you. We should have gone for Planet of the Werebears instead.”
Aurora grabbed Molly. “Come on. Let’s go to the bar. I need a drink after that time-waster.”
“Which bar should we go to? The Sundowner is right over there, or we could go down the street to the Beater.”
“The Sundowner’s kinda snooty, isn’t it?”
“Snooty? When did you ever care about snooty?” Molly questioned.
“We aren’t exactly the Sundowner’s ideal customers. We would be massively underdressed.” Aurora replied sagely.
“Then it’s the Beater, in which case we’ll be massively overdressed.” Molly stated. “I just didn’t think you’d want to get busy with one of the guys there. They’re kind of rough around the edges, you know.”
“Will you cut it out with that getting busy stuff? If anyone’s getting busy tonight, it’s you.” Aurora responded sharply. “Shoot, I wouldn’t be surprised if you have a regular line-up of gentlemen friends at the Beater.”
“Now you’re making me mad.” Molly spoke through gritted teeth. “I’m trying to give you a good time and you insult me. Come on. We’re not leaving until I have to pour you back into my car to drive you home.”
The two young women walked down the street laughing and slugging each other in the shoulders. The streetlights came on and the stores went dark along Park Street, but the neon sign over the Beater sizzled with a seedy glow.
A spark of wicked excitement ran through Aurora’s chest. She’d never been inside a place like this before. The exaggerated shouts of strange men rang through the door, and the burly bouncer standing on the sidewalk outside looked her up and down when Molly led her up to the entrance. No one looked at Aurora Cunningham that way back home. No one would dare. This was the closest Aurora ever came to doing something she shouldn’t.
She didn’t have time to hesitate when Molly waltzed right in. Aurora had no choice but to follow. Darkness surrounded her the minute she walked through the door. She stopped on the threshold until her eyes adjusted to the light.
The menacing shapes of men cluttered the room, but Aurora couldn’t identify any of them in the dark. She couldn’t see a single woman – not even Molly. She was alone in this place.
Red and blue strobe lights flashed and wheeled in every direction in the darkened room. They swept over the bar and around to a stage where a band, their amps turned up way too loud, pretended to practice and test their microphones.
Out of the shadows, Molly appeared, inches away from Aurora’s face. She bellowed at the top of her lungs to be heard over the noise. “Come on. Let’s get our drinks.”
Aurora strained her voice to shout back. “We can’t just stand around here?”
Molly pointed to the far end of the bar. “We can get a booth. It’s not so loud back there.”
Aurora didn’t want to know how Molly knew that. Asking would raise too many awkward questions, so she let Molly tow her into the crowd. They fought their way through sweaty bodies and lurid stares to the bar. Molly hollered to the bartender and paid for two drinks. Aurora didn’t want to know what they were, either.
She didn’t want to know much of anything about this place. No one else wanted to know, either. Everyone took shelter in the darkness and the noise and the smell of alcohol so no one had to bother about knowing anything.
Molly was right about the booth being quieter, though. The band’s amps pointed out toward the entrance and left the booths behind them quiet enough to hold a decent conversation. Regular lights made the place slightly more tolerable.
The two friends slid into a booth near the back and Molly set the drinks in front of them. Aurora copied Molly by taking a sip through her straw. The sweet, alcoholic liquid glided down her throat and made her head buzz.
Molly laid a hand on Aurora’s arm. “Now listen to me, honey. I didn’t bring you all the way into town just to wine and dine you. I want to talk to you about something important.”
Aurora froze. “What do you want to talk about?”
“When are you gonna find yourself a man? You’re twenty-three and stunning. You should at least have had a sweetheart by now, but unless you’re keeping someone a secret from me, you haven’t even been out on a date.”
“Come on, Molly. You know we don’t work it like that.”
“I don’t want to hear about how you work it. When are you gonna get yourself a man? I don’t want to see you grow old and grey alone.”
“Twenty-three is hardly old and grey. I have a few years left before I dry up.”
“You know what I mean. You’re not even looking.”
“So what if I’m not? I’m sure I’ll find the right guy when the time comes.”
“You can’t just sit around Cunningham Homestead and wait for the right guy to fall into your lap. You’ve got to get out there and play the field.”
Aurora turned away. “Give me a break. I’m not playing the field.”
“Well what in the name of Mother Mary are you doing? Are you sitting home and reading romance novels? Are you writing away for a mail-order husband? Please tell me you have some plan for your future.” Molly questioned and prodded her friend.
“You’re starting to sound like my mother. Why do I need a plan to nab some guy and live happily ever after? Isn’t it enough that I’m living my life and enjoying it?”
“Think how much more you could be enjoying it if you had a man.”
“I don’t need a man, and I definitely don’t need the kind of man I would have to go hunting for. If I can’t find the right man in the right place, then he’s not the right man for me.”
“You’re going about this all wrong.”
“I’m afraid you’re the one who has it all wrong. We have ways of doing things you don’t understand.”
“Oh, don’t give me that bull hockey about having ways of doing things I don’t understand. Can’t you have a conversation with a friend without bringing your precious rules into it?”
“I’m sorry, darling, but there are other factors involved in me finding the right man than just going to a bar and dragging some poor dude home by the hair.” Aurora calmly began to explain her position. “For a start, my parents wouldn’t accept just anybody and I don’t really want to….”
Molly held up one hand to cut her off. “I don’t want to hear it. There’s a whole world of decent guys outside and you just keep making excuses for why they’re not good enough. I don’t want to hear any more excuses,” she stated with finality in her tone.
Aurora opened her mouth to say something else when she heard a familiar voice. It came from the booth behind her back.
“I’m telling ya’, the authorities won’t do anythin’ to protect this town for law-abiding citizens like you and me, so we’ll just have to get out there and do something for ourselves. We can’t allow these things to run us around in fear anymore.”
Another man answered the first. “Well, what can we do? They hide up there behind their private property signs where we can’t get to ‘em. If we get caught trespassin’, it’s us who’ll get thrown in jail.”
The first man brought his fist down hard on the table top. “Do you think I care about some useless private property sign? I’ve been up there a thousand times, and you don’t see any donut-munching sheriff throwing me in jail. We’ll drive up there at night and lay traps for them all around their territory. No one will be the wiser until it’s too late,” he ended confidently,
Aurora froze in her seat, and her blood ran cold in her veins. The voice belonged to Bain Campbell, the hunter who got caught hunting Bruins on their own land in the hills around Bruins’ Peak.
Everyone on Bruins’ Peak knew the story by now. Aiken Dunlap scratched Bain across the face and left three parallel scars running down his cheek, but he showed mercy and left Bain alive instead of killing him outright, even though Bain had come after Aiken with a rifle and tried to shoot him on his own land.
Word went out to every Bruin tribe to keep an eye on Bain. He would never leave the Bruins alone, but would spend the rest of his life seeking revenge. No one in town would believe him when he told them about people turning into bears and back into people again. No one in town would believe the truth when they heard it, but Bain was still dangerous. He bent all his crazy energy on proving his tales to the town.
“I know an old gully running down between Dunlap territory and Farrell territory, the one they call Horner’s Gully. No one knows about it but me and those people. We can lay a run of traps along that gully and no one will catch us. We’ll use the big old jaw traps to break their legs,” he outlined cunningly.
“What’ll we do once we catch ‘em?” another man asked. “They’ll be dangerous when they’re hurt – a lot more dangerous than we’ve seen ‘em before.”
“Dangerous! Ha! I’ll give ‘em dangerous. Once we have ‘em caught in the traps, we’ll shoot them from a distance. We never have to go near ‘em until they’re dead. Then we can skin ‘em and sell their hides and teeth and claws to the broker. The buzzards can have the rest.”
The first hunter who spoke shifted in his seat. “I don’t like it, man. They have friends all over. If word gets out about this….”
“Will you cork it, Holmes? Word will not get out unless you go crying to your little sister about it. If you do that, you might as well put it on the front page of the Daily Times, ‘cuz everyone will know. The place I’m talking about is buried in the deep mountains. I doubt anyone has been there in years,” Bain angrily replied.
“Then how do you know they’ll go there?”
“They go there all the time. I’ve seen bear sign there.” Bain shot back.
“How do you know those were the people?” Someone else asked.
Bain slapped his comrade on the arm. “You dolt! What difference does it make if they were people or real bears? We’ll have the skins either way. We get paid either way. Now who’s with me?”
No one answered him. Aurora hung on every word. So Bain and his friends planned to lay traps in Horner’s Gully on Bruins’ Peak – jaw traps, the kind that would crush a Bruin’s leg and leave him defenseless and crippled – until the hunters came to get him.
Aurora knew the gully Bain meant. Everyone knew Horner’s Gully, and Bain was right. No human ever set foot there. The Bruins hunted in that gully to get away from the human world. They rambled and fished and rested there in their bear forms without a care in the world.
If Bain succeeded in his plan, all that peace and tranquility would go up in smoke. The first Bruin to fall into his traps would never be able to get out and warn others. Any number of Bruins could lose their lives down there before anyone found out what was going on.
Molly waved her hand in front of Aurora’s face and snapped her out of her trance. “‘Hello?’ ‘Ground control to Major Tom.’ ‘Earth calling Aurora.’ Where did you go just now?”
Aurora shuddered. “Sorry to run out on you like this, Molly, but I gotta go.”
“Go? The night’s just starting. You haven’t gotten busy with any of these strapping specimens yet.”
Aurora slid out of the booth. “Sorry, sister. It ain’t gonna happen – not tonight, anyway.”
Molly started to follow her. “At least let me give you a ride home. You can’t walk all the way.”
Aurora held up her hand, but she was already heading towards the door. “I’ll be fine. You stay here and bag your specimen. I gotta move, and I gotta move fast. I’ll see you around sometime.”
She bolted for the front entrance. She shouldered men out of the way. She didn’t care who she jostled or offended. She had to get out of there. She had to get home, back to Bruins’ Peak, and warn somebody, anybody about what she heard.
The words kept repeating in her head. Bain Campbell and his friends were on their way to set traps on the mountain. He would maim and kill as many Bruins as he could. She had to shout the news to anyone who would listen. She had to find a way to stop him.
Chapter 3
Austin Farrell gave his truck door a backwards karate kick to slam it shut. He twirled his key chain around his index finger and strutted up to the front door of the Beater.
He had spent the last three months logging out the north slope of timber in the Farrell tribe’s wood lots, and just a few hours ago he finished sawing up the logs into lumber for the new tannery. Life was good, and Austin had earned the right to celebrate tonight.
No one knew better than Austin what a waste dump the Beater was. That’s why he chose it for his regular watering hole. His family didn’t approve of him cruising the human scene for after-hours entertainment, but that just made it all the more appealing.
He could enjoy the seedy side of the Beater without ever feeling tempted by anyone he met there. The few women who came into the bar would never appeal to him. He could stand around and look at them, while having a drink or two, without ever worrying about wanting to touch one.
His boot heels struck the pavement with a satisfying thunk. The impact swelled out his chest. He could associate with these frail humans, against the scolding of his people, and no one in the whole bar knew his secret. None of them suspected he was stronger and faster and more deadly than all of them put together.
He exchanged a nod of recognition with the bouncer. He knew the man, even though they never talked. They acknowledged each other with their eyes – nothing more.
Austin put out his hand to grasp the door handle when the door flew open from the inside. Someone flew out, collided with Austin, and bounced off before he knew what happened. The person’s head barely touched his chin, and they ricocheted off his chest.
Austin put out his hands to catch the person from falling over. “Whoa! Take it easy! What’s the rush?”
That’s when he found himself face to face with Aurora Cunningham. She tried to barge straight past him. “Get out of my way. I’m in a hurry.”
He took a side-step into her path. “Not so fast! What do you think you’re doing down here? Does your Pop know where you are? Better yet, does your brother Walker know where you are? Do they know you’re down here mixing with the locals?”
Aurora narrowed her eyes at him. “As it happens, yes, my brother Walker and my Pop both know where I am and what I’m doing. I could ask you the same question. Does your brother Brody know you’re here?”
“I don’t answer to Brody.”
“Of course you do. He’s your Alpha since your father died, and he would whoop the stuffing out of you if he knew you were down here.”
“He knows I come here, and he doesn’t care.”
“He doesn’t care? Now I know you’re a lying sack of scum. I’ll bet they’ve been working on you for years to find a mate and get married, just like they’ve been working on me.”
He held out both hands. “All right, all right; so we’re both doing something we shouldn’t, except you’ve got permission from your Pop and Walker, whereas I’m here on the down low. So why don’t you tell me where you’re going in such a hurry? Do you even have a ride home?”
“I don’t have time to talk about it right now. I gotta go.”
She shouldered her way past him, and this time, he let her pass. He fell in at her side going the opposite direction he went when he first got out of his truck. “At least tell me how you got into town. Tell me you didn’t walk here all the way from Cunningham Homestead.”
“I didn’t walk here. My friend Molly Shannon drove me. We were out together – until just now.”
“Okay, I won’t ask why you left in such a hurry. Just tell me you don’t plan to walk all the way home in the dark.”
Aurora stopped walking and fixed him with a malicious glare. “Don’t you think I can take care of myself in the dark?”
A slight smirk spread over his face. “Oh, I’m sure you can take care of yourself. Just let me give you a ride home.”
“I don’t need your old ride.”
“You don�
�t need it, but whatever made you run out of the bar like that will get done a lot faster if you let me give you a ride. Come on. My truck’s right back there in the parking lot. I’ll have you home in no time.”
Aurora hesitated. Ride home with this…this stripling? Austin Farrell had a reputation on Bruins’ Peak any well-bred girl would take care to hold at a distance. He could go off at any time like a loaded gun dropped from the roof. He took no notice of the rules – at least, he never showed any sign of noticing them.
Anything anybody told Austin Farrell NOT to do, that’s exactly what he turned around and did. If the rules said stay away from outsiders and don’t associate with people in town, he made a point of coming into town to associate with them. If the rules said the Farrells are at war with the Cunninghams so stay away from them, he made a point of going right up to their house to spy on them and make trouble. That’s the kind of guy Austin Farrell was.
He wasn’t a stripling anymore, either. She saw that at one glance He stood taller than Aurora remembered, and his scrawny body filled out with solid muscle under his black tank top. His arms cut backward at the elbow in thick wings to angle down his back in a broad triangle ending at his narrow waist. Powerful thighs filled out his jeans.
He still wore his hair buzzed off close to his scalp with a trimmed goatee around his mouth. His sleeveless shirt showed off intricate tribal tattoos running down his arms to curl around his wrists. His chest invited any woman in sight to imagine what patterns and shapes dipped and dived over those undulating muscles.
Ride home with him? The thought gave her a thrill, but she shouldn’t. Then again, a ride home would get her there faster. She could tell Walker and her brother Dax what Bain had planned in time for them to do something to stop him.
“I can’t take a ride home with you. I’m sorry. Thanks for the offer.”
The grin evaporated off his face. “I guess you wouldn’t accept help from a Farrell. I should have known. I’ll see you later. Have a nice walk. Don’t get into trouble out there.”
Bruins' Peak Bears Box Set (Volume I) Page 31